Season of Grace Coming Out of the Void
by Nancy Brown
Summary: The only things worse at Christmas than invading aliens are invading in-laws. Rabbit Hole AU.
1. Chapter 1

Title: Season of Grace (Coming Out of the Void)  
Author: **nancybrown**  
Rating: PG-15  
Characters/Pairings: Jack/Ianto/Lisa, Alice/Johnson, Rhiannon, Jonny, Steven, David, Mica, OCs  
Warnings: domesticity, mention of past child death, alcohol abuse, exposition abuse, foul language, sentence fragments  
Spoilers: up through CoE  
Series: Rabbithole AU  
Wordcount: 19,000  
Beta: The wonderful **51stcenturyfox**  
Summary: The only things worse at Christmas than invading aliens are invading in-laws.  
Author's Note: If you'd like to read well-written Jack/Ianto/Lisa get thee hither to **amand_r**'s "We held gold dust in our hands," for it is made of awesome. This story right here? Is made of fluff and not much else. Title from Vienna Teng.

* * *

Mornings began any number of ways in their household, from Isabelle's wails to Rift alerts, from phone calls in the dead of night to Callie and Kyle turning up the volume for their cartoons. Good mornings meant being able to ignore the rustles and bumps from outside the door, and greeting the day properly. The worst mornings tended to be those which were still technically holdovers from last night, or even the night before.

This morning began after a late night chasing a pair of Hoix methheads halfway across Grangetown. Lisa had lost (or won) the toss to stay home while the kids slept, tracking Jack and Ianto's progress on the hunt, rerouting stoplights for the little traffic there was at that time of night, and keeping an eye out on the regular channels in case this was a distraction for something else. They'd all been caught flat-footed last month, with a widespread Weevil release to cover the theft of that scout ship UNIT was supposed to have secured better. Nothing else had come through or attacked last night, and the boys had dragged home at quarter past three, covered in enough grime that they showered before falling into bed. Even Jack wanted sleep.

So it seemed unfair, a little, that just after five, a tiny finger poked him in the arm. "Uncle Jack?"

Jack cracked open one eye, and met two twinkling brown eyes peeping over the side of the bed. "Huh?"

"He came!" Callie's whisper was loud enough to fill the room. Jack dredged through the functional parts of his brain to try and make sense of her words.

He settled for another "Huh?"

"Father Christmas came!" She grabbed his arm. "Come on!" Jack let out a groan.

From the other side of the bed, Lisa said, "Go back to bed, Callie. Your presents will still be there in a few hours."

"He left footprints, Mama! All over Papa's nice rug!"

There was a completely unintelligible noise from Ianto. Possibly it was meant to be a protest, but since he'd been the one last night to insist on the sooty footprints, it wasn't much of one.

"Bed," Jack said. "Presents later."

Callie scowled, looking just like her father when she did, and Jack leaned over to kiss her on the head. She pulled the door behind her as she went back to her own bedroom. Jack was asleep again before he heard her door close.

* * *

Morning came again a few hours later, when Callie had drawn Kyle to her cause. Two sets of eyes this time peeked over the edge of the bed, and Jack knew he wasn't getting away with more sleep this time. He shooed them out, pulled on denims and a white t-shirt, and shut the door gently behind him. Isabelle would wake up any time now, and she would be enough of an alarm to wake Lisa and Ianto. In the meantime, they could sleep a little longer.

He put a DVD into the player for the kids and fetched them bowls of dry cereal to eat in front of the telly. Callie waited impatiently to delve into her stocking. Kyle, not quite two yet, was more interested in his Cheerios and the adventures of the Teletubbies.

"Be good," he told them both, and headed to work. Someone needed to feed and water the residents, and anyway he'd hidden Ianto and Lisa's present in the bottom drawer of his desk.

When he returned forty-five minutes later --- Weevils fed, Frycheul the dinosaur given a new teddy bear to savage, and gift obtained --- Lisa was awake and nursing Isabelle while Ianto got the coffee and grownup breakfast ready. Callie had changed the DVD to Sesame Street and was singing along with Elmo while Kyle watched, Cheerios all around him on the floor. Jack rarely took photographs anymore, but this was a picture he wanted to remember. Before he could locate the camera setting on his phone, though, Callie had seen him and ploughed into his knees.

"He's home! Can we open presents now?"

"Soon," Ianto said. "The rest of us need to finish breakfast first." On cue, Isabelle pulled off and let out a wet burble. Jack grabbed her and swung her to his shoulder for a quick burp while Lisa buttoned her dressing gown. Seeing the disappointed stares from both men, she unbuttoned the top two buttons again, giving everyone a nice ogle.

Jack settled Isabelle into her highchair for the rest of her breakfast, some warmed rice cereal fed to her by her daddy, who'd already gulped down his own eggs and toast. Jack wanted the camera again, but ate his food instead.

"Nothing new overnight," Jack said. "I left messages with everyone to check in today."

"You didn't call them!" said Lisa. "It's Christmas."

"Texts. Anyway, Gwen's already checked in. Edward was awake early this morning."

Ianto said, "That reminds me. Rhiannon mentioned dropping by after dinner for a few minutes. We should silence the alarm now or we're going to forget again." Rhiannon had only been present once for a Rift alert. Convincing her it was a malfunctioning smoke detector meant a lot of flirting on Jack's part, and a lot of eye-rolling from Ianto while he did it.

All the alerts in the Hub were wired to go off at their house and at Gwen's, with Jack's wrist strap as a backup. A secondary signal would go to everyone's mobiles, but that didn't do them much good when a third of the team was in London to be with family. Here in Cardiff, Gwen and Rhys' families were coming in to celebrate Edward's first Christmas. Andy was spending the day with his mum. While Johnson was still around, she'd already informed him Joe had custody of Steven until New Year's and Jack was not going to bother her if he could help it; no use alienating Alice further. That left the three of them watching things, and since Christmas over the past several years had brought aliens, monsters and worse, Jack was ready for almost anything.

"Now?" asked Callie, as Jack took the last bite of his toast.

"Now," Lisa said, and Callie let out a yell of delight.

Ianto found the camera and snapped pictures of Callie and Kyle going through their stockings like dervishes. The two of them "helped" Isabelle with hers, though they were disappointed to find no toys in it, merely a new soother and some bibs. Callie squealed through opening her new dolls, squealed more when she opened a new paint set, and went in paroxysms of glee when she found the wooden sword Father Christmas had left behind the tree with her name etched on the side.

Lisa offered Jack a raised eyebrow at that one, but she'd been the one to say he couldn't buy them toy guns yet.

Kyle played with his new cars while clutching Isabelle's new ragdoll in one arm. The baby herself was satisfied with sticking the boxes the cars came in into her mouth. The floor was a mess with wrapping paper and torn cardboard, not to mention the sooty footprints around the fireplace. Jack set a private timer in his head for how long it would take Ianto to break down and get out the Hoover, and then chuckled as Ianto did just that.

While they cleared away the paper, Jack glanced at the handful of presents still under the tree, a few each for David and Mica and their parents, and the gifts the three of them would exchange in a few minutes. A new jumper or two, socks, some books each of them had wanted, and of course the present he'd brought from work, smuggled into the house in the pocket of his greatcoat.

Jack carried another armful of cardboard to the recycling pile and then flung himself onto the sofa, lifting his feet just as Ianto hovered the rug in front of him. "You should stop for now," Jack said, reaching out for a friendly grope as Ianto bent to get under the coffee table. "We're just going to open more stuff."

"We don't rip things to shreds," Ianto said. "I just want to get the little bits up."

Lisa said, "Let him." She went into the kitchen to wipe up the breakfast dishes so Jack would have room to navigate when he started the goose and stuffing in a little while. He kept an eye on the kids as Ianto emptied the canister and put the vacuum away, fortunately so as a wheel popped off one of Kyle's cars and made its way into Isabelle's hand. Jack picked up the cars and carried them upstairs to Kyle's room, checking the others as he went.

The doorbell rang.

"Got it," Ianto said, worry and confusion in his voice. Jack hurried back downstairs as the door opened. His first thought was that Rhiannon and Jonny were early. His second was that their family must have grown overnight.

"Douglas?"

"Surprise!" Rhiannon grinned widely as Ianto stood at the doorway. Lisa's brother, his wife and their kids stood outside with the Davies family, all looking inordinately pleased with themselves. "Happy Christmas!"

"Happy Christmas," Ianto said, and on what was clearly autopilot he add, "Come in." Something in his face broke. "It's freezing out, come inside."

The parents and kids piled into the hallway, shedding coats and boots. Lisa had pulled her dressing gown tightly around her and helped stash the outer wear in the hall closet. Jack ran back upstairs to get an old towel for the boots to dry on. As he came back down, Lisa's sister-in-law said, "Oh. And this must be Jack."

He offered her a perfect smile. "That's me. Angela, isn't it?" He smoothed out the towel and went to take her hand but she'd already turned to help her daughters get their boots off.

"Angie," she said.

"Good to finally meet you," said Lisa's brother, taking Jack's hand instead. "Douglas Hallett."

Jack aimed his smile at Douglas. "Lisa talks about you all the time." Jack had seen the man before at Lisa and Ianto's wedding, but explaining that would be difficult, and anyway, Douglas hadn't been the one Jack had gone there to see.

"Likewise. I have to say I'm surprised to see you here. We thought you'd be with your own family for the holidays."

"Well. You know." The official story was that he'd moved in with Ianto and Lisa after his wife had kicked him out and he'd had nowhere else to go. They'd bought the house together back in September, all three names on the deed. Two of the children had no memories of a life before Jack, and the third had been coached for her own sake to say "Uncle" instead of "Dad." Aside from the tentative steps he'd been taking to regain Alice's trust, this was his family now. Yet as far as their siblings knew, Jack was merely Ianto and Lisa's housemate.

"Speaking of surprises," Ianto said, sliding carefully between them and shaking Douglas's hand, "why are you here?"

"It's Christmas!" Jonny said from behind him, slapping his back with a meaty hand. Jack caught the look of glazed horror that filled and then carefully smoothed out of Ianto's face.

Rhiannon took Ianto's arm and swung him around for a hug now that her coat was off. "It's your first Christmas back home, you dumbo. You two, off in London, off in Paris, and we haven't had a proper Christmas with the kids yet."

Douglas said, "We wanted to get out of the city. Christmastime in London is getting infamous."

"And it's Izzy's first Christmas," said Angie. "And we've only met her the once." She shooed the girls off to play. Mica had already gone to see Callie's new toys, and David had followed with a distinctly bored expression.

"Isabelle," Lisa corrected her absently. "You should have called." She added, "So we could clean."

"I did," said Douglas. "You said you didn't have any plans and were staying home. That's when we decided to bring the family to you." He looked at Jack. "We've booked rooms for the night at a hotel. We won't be putting you out."

"It's no problem," said Jack.

Ianto said, "It's just a surprise."

Lisa said, "Let's not just stand in the hallway. Come on."

She coaxed everyone into the living room with the kids. Ashley or maybe Hailey --- they were fraternal twins but Jack didn't know the difference and hadn't been introduced as to who was wearing pink today and who purple --- was picking up Isabelle under the arms. Ianto plucked her away before either child got hurt. "Thanks, I'll get her."

Ianto lifted Isabelle and made a face. "Ugh. Lisa, come lend me a hand?"

"Sure."

"I'll help straighten up upstairs," Jack said. "My room's a mess."

He followed Ianto and Lisa up, while Ianto called down: "Rhi, you've been here before. Can you put on the tea?"

Ianto took Isabelle into the room they pretended was Jack's and laid her on the bed. Jack shut the door behind Lisa.

"Shit," Ianto said, rubbing his hair.

Jack asked Lisa, "What did you say to him?"

"I told him we were staying home. I said it was too hard to travel with the kids this small." She sat down on the bed beside Isabelle. "She's not dirty."

Ianto said, "If that's the biggest lie I have to tell today, we're going to be doing very well."

"Callie knows what to say," Jack said. "We practised." He started rearranging the room in places, making it look lived-in. He'd have to get his shampoo and so on from their en suite and put them in the main bath. At least his clothes were already here; Lisa's clothes filled the wardrobe in the master bedroom, leaving this one for Ianto and Jack to share.

Lisa said, "We could tell them Isabelle's been feeling ill, encourage them not to stay."

"They'll be here overnight at least," Ianto said. "They're not driving back to London tonight." He sat down on the bed on the other side of his daughter. "Shit."

"It'll be fine," Jack said, and rubbed Ianto's shoulders.

"No, it won't," Ianto said, sounding petulant. "This was supposed to be perfect." He looked at Lisa. "This was going to be our first real Christmas."

"We've had Christmas before, dear."

"Not like this year. Last year, you were pregnant with Isabelle. Year before that with Kyle. This is the first Christmas where our family is complete." He glanced at Jack. "All of us." He stroked Isabelle's hair, and Jack thought back to the past several weeks, how Ianto had been insisting on just the right tree, the perfect presents for the children, planning every detail.

"So we postpone things," Lisa said. "They'll go home tomorrow, we'll pretend Boxing Day is our Christmas. Happens all the time."

"Yeah," said Jack. "Used to do that when Alice was little." He'd done that when his other children had been small, as well. He tried not to think about how this was the first Christmas where he intentionally wasn't sending Frank a card, instead of just forgetting like he often had. Suddenly it was hard to breathe, and he stared at Isabelle and reminded himself that the world was different now.

Lisa looked from one to the other of them. "You're both a million miles away right now, you know that?"

"Sorry," Jack said, and Ianto shrugged. Jack went to the closet and pulled out a shirt, royal blue for preference. He slipped it over his t-shirt, felt the cloth slide into place like armour. "Look, I'm going to go back into work. It'll make things easier."

"You can't go," Lisa said, as Ianto said, "You're leaving?"

"Fewer landmines to tread on while I'm not around. I'll stay there tonight, watch over things, be back in the morning as soon as they're gone." He kissed Lisa quickly, rubbing his thumb at her frown.

Ianto stood, but refused to kiss him. "This is your home. This is _our_ home," he gestured, including them all. "We're not letting them chase you out." He wrapped his hands in Jack's shirt. "Stay."

"You know this is a better plan," Jack said, and he pressed his lips against Ianto's anyway although Ianto refused to respond. "I'll call tonight."

Lisa said, "Call before bedtime. Callie gets upset when you work late."

"Shit," Ianto said again.

Isabelle made a noise that sounded like "Tit!"

Lisa's eyes went wide and then she covered her mouth to giggle. Jack shook his finger at Ianto, smirking. "And stop swearing in front of the children."

Jack went to get his personal hygiene supplies and hide them in the wrong bath, and as an afterthought, went through their bedroom to seek out any obvious signs he shared it. Fortunately, life with a curious three-and-a-half year old meant they always put the more interesting things away in the nightstand.

Ianto and Lisa were back downstairs when he went down. Lisa was having a polite, if strained, conversation with Angie about dinner. Damn. Jack had been planning to cook the goose. Ianto was already in the kitchen working on the tea and coffee, and wouldn't meet Jack's eyes. Jack turned on the oven and pulled the goose out of the refrigerator. There were more containers inside the fridge than he remembered.

"They brought food," said Ianto. "Turkey, potatoes, I think Angie mentioned sweet potatoes. Rhiannon brought something veg and a pie. Two pies. Didn't want to eat us out of house and home, she said."

"Very kind." Jack had intended to make a good old-fashioned stuffing. He'd also intended to make a good old-fashioned pudding if he could scrape his memory for the recipe. Instead, he ripped some bread into chunks, mixed in a cracked egg, salt, pepper and some rosemary, and called it done.

"I hate this," Ianto said in a low voice, carefully drowned out by the sounds of seven children and five adults in the other room.

"Me too." The oven clicked to temperature and Jack shoved the goose in, setting a timer for the others. He didn't dare try for another kiss, not now, and settled for watching Ianto finish the motions of tea and coffee. Ianto put a healthy dollop of brandy into his own mug. "See you tomorrow," Jack said.

"Yeah."

Jack grabbed his greatcoat on the way out. Jonny shouted from the living room, "Where you goin'? Everything's closed today."

"Something I forgot to do at work. Try to have fun without me."

The joke fell hard, especially when Callie stopped playing with her toys. "You're leavin'?"

"I'll be back," he said.

"When?"

"Soon." It wasn't a lie. On Jack's personal timescale, returning during Callie's lifespan counted as "soon." Callie knew just enough to understand, and her face drew into a pout. He couldn't stand the sight, not right now, not stuck in the memories of too many holidays of all stripes spent alone (or with someone whose sole purpose to Jack was to keep him from being alone) and too many people he'd disappointed.

He reached the door and took a breath, then opened it.

Johnson's finger was halfway to the doorbell.

"Ah, running out on Christmas," said Alice. "Never seen that trick before."

* * *

Ianto froze halfway between the kitchen and the living room, the mugs on a tray and completely forgotten. He'd only met Alice once, but Johnson was there with her, looking uncomfortable, and Jack was staring at them.

Then Steven chirped up, "Hi, Uncle Jack!" Jack broke his stare for a wide grin and bent down for a big hug. Heads poked out from the living room, and Ianto hurried in to distract them with hot drinks, listening in with half an ear.

"You're busy," said Alice. "We should go."

"No!" Jack said quickly. "I was just about to step out. Maybe we could go somewhere together."

Alice said, "That's not necessary. Kate wanted to drop by for a few minutes. We can come visit another time."

Lisa mouthed, "Kate?" Ianto tilted his head at Johnson. It was on her employee records though he'd have sworn she'd kill him if he ever called her by that name.

"Who's this, then?" Rhiannon asked in a friendly tone.

Lisa said, "Jack's sister." That was the cover the two of them had chosen for the sake of Alice's ex, and had kept up for Steven's benefit. Alice's mum had been in on the story as well, hadn't she, so that made three.

"Ah, perfect!" said Jonny. "Told ya, Christmas is for bein' with your family."

Ianto could just see Jack's face half-lit in the light from outside, and then Jack grinned in that way he had, the one that melted the snows and lit the world. "You're right. Come on in, everyone," he said, and tossed his greatcoat back in the closet.

Johnson hung back at the doorway, and Ianto noticed something in her hands. She looked at Jack. "I made a cake."

Lisa and Ianto exchanged glances, and Lisa hurried to the hallway. "That's lovely, thank you." She took the covered plate from Johnson's arms so she could take off her coat. She was wearing a jumper and denims instead of black leather, thank God.

"You cook?" Jack asked.

"Don't let it get around," said Johnson, and underlying the joke was a threat. Ah. They were all on a much better footing here, then.

"I'll check on dinner," Ianto said, meeting Lisa in the kitchen. Johnson came in with her while Alice and Jack talked in a low voice in the hallway.

As soon as they were in the kitchen, Lisa said to Johnson, "You know you're both welcome here." She made room in the icebox for the cake.

Ianto said, "At any time. But why didn't you call first?"

"I was going to, but every time I reached for my mobile, she started talking about going home instead." Without an invitation, Johnson got herself some coffee. Shyness wasn't high on her list of personal foibles. "Any minute, I expect she'll come up with a reason to go."

"Why did you come?" Lisa asked, and Ianto blessed her in his heart because she could make it sound polite instead of the tense scream he was verging on. He took a sip from his laced coffee as Lisa said, "I thought Steven was with his father today."

Johnson had a drink from her own mug before answering. "He was supposed to be. Joe called yesterday right before he was supposed to pick Steven up to say he'd gotten a deal on a last minute cruise, just him and the new wife. They flew out last night." She had more coffee. "Steven didn't take it well. He doesn't get much time with his dad. He's getting old enough to want a male role model, but the one he's supposed to have is barely around. Joe's father died a while ago, neither of us has a brother, so that leaves … "

"Jack."

"Who isn't the best role model for anyone, and you should know I think you're crazy for having him under the same roof as your children." She took another drink. "But given a choice between him and nothing, even Alice agrees it could be worse. Anyway, he's calmed down lately. Jack, I mean. You've been good for him." Johnson looked at Ianto, then at Lisa. It was the longest conversation she'd ever had with either of them that didn't directly involve work. "God, I hate this holiday. Bad food, worse music, everyone pretending to enjoy being around people they can't stand the rest of the year, and no convenient alien or foreign threats to hunt down."

Lisa laughed. "Jack said the same thing two days ago."

Ianto said, "He did?" That hurt more than he was expecting.

"Don't tell Alice," said Johnson, pouring herself more coffee and frowning. "She'll get upset again."

"We should go be social," Lisa said, dread on her face. Ianto wrapped his hand in hers and walked back to the living room.

* * *

Steven and David were squirreled up in a corner of the sitting room, poring over the tiny screen of David's Nintendo. Callie, Mica and the twins had gathered all the dollies and the sword into their arms and were trudging up to Callie's bedroom to play, dragging Kyle with them in their wake. That left the adults and Isabelle. Lisa snatched up her daughter from the floor and cuddled her as a shield against the rest of the room. Jack made a space for the two of them on the settee beside him and she gratefully sat down. Ianto crouched on the floor at her side, and she saw the look on Johnson's face, on Alice's, that they'd positioned themselves as three against the world. Again.

"Well, isn't this nice?" said Rhiannon contrary to all evidence. "It's a gorgeous tree."

Angie said, "I love what you've done with the house. It's eclectic."

Ianto said, "Our theme was 'childproofing.'"

Lisa laughed. "You should have seen us the first couple of weeks, all crawling around looking for hazards."

"Hands and knees everywhere," Jack said, and it sounded dirty because it was Jack (and because, well, of course they'd enjoyed themselves while they'd been down there on the floor). She didn't miss Doug's expression and she pressed her lips to Isabelle's hair so she could look away easily, but that only led her to looking at Jack, and noticing that Steven had most of his attention just now.

"Alice," Doug said, "you said Jack's your brother?" Alice nodded. "So are you American as well?"

"Oh no," said Alice, catching Jack's eye again. "I was born in Cardiff and raised in London." She took a drink of her coffee. "Dad got around."

Johnson sputtered into her own coffee with a laugh.

"Yes, he did," said Jack, with a smile in his voice. "Someday I'll have to introduce you to the family up in Aberdeen." His mobile rang, and he pulled it out, checking the name and putting it back. He looked at Ianto when he mouthed: "Andy."

"We have family in Aberdeen?" Alice looked dumbfounded. Lisa wanted to ask the same thing, but there was never a good time. Jack had told them about his past, but in drips and drabs, and mostly about the parts which featured them. The other them. The ones who'd died. Ianto was obsessing about this being their first real Christmas together, and while Lisa could remember all the ones that had preceded it, she also couldn't say for certain that he was wrong.

Sometimes Jack watched her and she knew he saw her body encased in metal, knew that sometimes he drew her mouth to his to remind himself she was real and alive, knew that each time he stroked his thumb down Ianto's cheek that he was wiping away a bad memory. How could she possibly ask what else he saw that he hadn't been able to change?

She resisted the urge to lay her head against him as he said, "I'll tell you later."

Angie said, "Douglas and Lisa are from near Aberdeen. Maybe they know your family!"

"I doubt it," said Lisa. "We moved to London when I was a baby."

Doug said, "And we didn't go back to visit much after."

"Still," Rhiannon said, "funny coincidence. Is their surname Harkness?"

Jack said, "There are a few names. Marriages, lack of marriages. You know how it goes." His mobile chirped that he had a text. He glanced at it. "Ah."

"Anything important?" Johnson asked, as if eager to be done with family and back to business.

"My friend Andy was calling to say have a good Christmas. Nice guy, bit strange." Jack put away his mobile and went back to watching Steven play with David. It wasn't like Jack to dismiss any of the team that way, and Lisa suspected it had been for the benefit of their audience. Andy was just checking in per Jack's request.

God, this was miserable. She'd grown so used to being unguarded here, to being safe. Their job meant holding so much back during the day, keeping so many secrets. Home was supposed to be where they could relax within one another and not have to worry about more than swearing or shagging in front of the kids. Lisa always felt her breath relax as soon as she stepped through the door. Sanctuary. Peace.

For the first time in five years, she wanted a cigarette.

They were saved by a stampede of little girls bounding down the stairs. "Can we open presents now?"

"Presents!"

Lisa counted noses. "Callie, where's your brother?"

"Upstairs."

"I'll get him," Ianto said, and she could read the gratitude on his face for having an excuse to get out of there.

Lisa asked Doug, "Did you get the gifts we sent?"

He smiled. "Yesterday. We brought them with us. Thought it'd be nice to open the girls' gifts with everyone." That was a good plan. The twins wouldn't feel excluded. Doug was good about that sort of thing, which made it even more annoying that he kept shooting glances at Jack as if mentally kicking him to the kerb.

* * *

"Where's my good boy?" Ianto said, opening Callie's door. Kyle sat on the floor surrounded by toys. At least his sister and her cousins hadn't dressed him up again. Every time Mica played with Callie, it seemed Kyle was turned into a spare babydoll, and it would only get worse when they were allowed to play with Isabelle.

Ianto scooped his son into his arms and touched Kyle's head with his nose. Kyle laughed.

"He's such a cutie," said Rhiannon.

Ianto turned, saw his own sister standing in the doorway. He hadn't realised she'd followed him, and the little bit of tension he'd managed to let go came roaring back.

"We like him," Ianto said, bouncing Kyle in his arms. He pursed his lips. "This was your idea, wasn't it? Everyone showing up?"

"You don't have to make it sound like that. Christmas is about family. Douglas and Angie and me were talking on the phone about how we hardly ever see you even though you're home now."

"You watch the kids every day," said Ianto.

"And I love it, but I like to see you for more than five minutes at a time! You're always rushing off."

"It's the job. We're always on the go."

"You're job's not that important, Ianto. You're a librarian."

His jaw set. "That's … part of my job. I have a lot of responsibilities." Which changed daily, depending on the need and Jack's whim. One minute he was buried in cataloguing alien tech that Tosh and Lisa hadn't figured out yet, cross-referencing species and timelines in order to identify, classify and perhaps even eventually use items that could be WMDs or random detritus from the Rift. The next minute, he was expected to dispose of dead Weevils who'd come up from the sewers with a taste for human and been stopped by Johnson, Mickey and Andy, coordinate with Lois about the latest honcho from UNIT who wanted to inspect their setup, remind Jack that calling said honcho a toadying arsewipe would only cause problems down the line, keep the staff caffeinated, go over reports with Gwen while Lois was occupied smoothing over the UNIT honcho's ruffled feathers, and in his downtime, search over profiles of potential doctors for the team because it was frankly ridiculous by this point that they hadn't hired someone. Or, as he called it otherwise, last Wednesday.

He loved his job, but things had been so much simpler when it had just been him and Lisa and Mme. Defarge.

"Of course you do," said Rhiannon soothingly. "I'm just saying you might not have to let it stress you out so much. I mean, it's not like the world's going to end if you misfile the encyclopaedias, yeah?"

He let out a short laugh, because really, there was no answer to that. "I wouldn't want to disappoint my boss," he said, because it was true.

"It's good to know your family ranks after your boss."

And then there _really_ was no answer to that, not without telling everything. How could he possibly explain about Mum, who'd seen the stars and given them up for Dad? How could he explain timelines and course corrections, and how he utterly believed Jack and his mad story about changing the world, about how his perfect little family would not exist now without that change? And how could he explain without sounding like he was simply paying Jack back for the gift, rather than falling headfirst into something he'd never known that he'd always wanted and now would do anything to keep?

It was completely insane, the way Jack had crashed into their lives like a wave, and all for the love of someone Ianto had never been.

In the middle of the night when Jack whispered the strangest stories, Ianto closed his eyes and could almost see the things Jack said he'd done, could almost remember himself. It was like having a twin brother he'd never known, who'd taken on pain and death to spare him. The glory was having this life and knowing he had it, and the horror was watching Jack's eyes and knowing Jack was seeing that doppelganger instead of him, was kissing that twin, was in love with that ghost. Ianto could accept the price of this existence, but he couldn't make Rhiannon begin to understand.

"Rhi … "

"Don't. If you don't want to spend time with me, with us, you could just say. You don't have to hide behind your job."

"I'm not."

"You are. You're embarrassed by us."

"That's not true," he said, even though it was, a little, and he hated himself for it.

"It is. You never liked Jonny. We're not posh enough for you, not like Lisa's family."

"We don't see them, either."

"That's because Douglas thinks she married down." True, but he hadn't known until just now that Rhiannon knew that.

"It's because Douglas treats her like a child. And you were the one who invited him here."

"We were trying to surprise you."

"It worked."

"It's your first Christmas back home since Dad died, Ianto."

"I know!" He didn't mean to shout, and he cuddled Kyle a bit to calm him. Dad's last Christmas had been in hospital. Ianto had dropped out of uni to take care of him when he'd taken ill, then had spent what turned into a year of waiting for him to die. Their father was every lost dream either of them had ever had. Invoking his name only made Ianto even more frightened for what he could lose now.

"Do you want me to go?" It wasn't sharp, not like he'd expected. Just sad, resigned, and that was completely earned.

"No. I'm glad you're here." He saw the disbelief all over her face, and came over carefully, not wanting to spook her. "I love you. I love the kids. I'll deal with Jonny," he added, and she bit her lips to stop the laugh. "I'm just really bad at handling surprises." He was sulking like a child, and it was time to drop it, past time. Lisa and Jack were having trouble with their own families and he didn't have to pile his own petulance on top of their problems.

Now if only it were that easy to do.

"Tell you what," he said, "let's make a plan next time. We go to the cinema. Just you and me."

She watched him suspiciously. "When? And how long 'till you call me up and cancel?"

"Next week. And I won't."

"Your job will get in the way again. You'll have to impress your boss with some of your amazing filing skills, I'm sure."

Ianto jostled Kyle into one arm and placed his other hand on her shoulder. "I'll make it up to him somehow."

* * *

Jack tore his gaze from Steven as Ianto came back down the stairs with Kyle and Rhiannon. Alice had cooled, barely, since her righteous anger with him over the incident with the 456, and he didn't dare ever tell her that not only could it have been worse, it had in fact been much worse. She didn't let Jack spend time unsupervised with her son, almost never spent time with Jack at all, except for that ill-fated dinner from a few months ago, and now today.

"Presents!" Callie squealed, as Ianto set Kyle on the floor, and Kyle mimicked her: "Pwesents!"

In a revisit of the morning, the room was filled with the sounds of delighted cries as all the kids opened gifts from their cousins. Only Steven had nothing to open, but David let him play with his video game while the others unpacked their loot. Callie opened more dolls and a pair of pretty dresses. Kyle opened a lorry (Jack would paint "Harwood's" on the side tomorrow) and a few cute little outfits. Jack was normally the most social of the three of them, had to swallow his own impulse to offer thanks for the gifts on the children's behalf. Instead, he slid to the floor beside Isabelle and wrapped his large hands around her small ones as she opened a new pink, lavender and blue blanket Rhi had knitted.

By silent agreement, their own gifts were pushed to the back of the tree, would be opened later.

All was well and all was well, and then David grabbed another package from under the tree. "This one doesn't have a name."

Jack petted Isabelle's hair and casually glanced over at what he'd found. His heart stopped, and he grabbed the oblong package out of David's hands. "Sorry. My fault. Didn't label that one."

"Who's it for?" asked Ashley or maybe Hailey, echoing the yuletide greed all the children were now watching him with as Jack instinctively pulled the package against himself. Even Steven was looking on with interest, although he'd opened his gifts from Jack at home.

"Your aunt and uncle. Don't worry about it." He started to put it back under the tree.

Angie said, "They're right here. Why don't you open it?" she said to Lisa.

"We're opening our gifts later," Lisa told her, and Jack blessed her silently.

"Anyway it's from Jack," said Alice. "You apparently haven't met his sense of humour yet."

Jack barked a laugh and said, "Yeah. Can't open everything in front of the kids." Ianto shot him a hard look, to which Jack responded with an innocent expression of his own, which only led to Ianto's frown growing as a distinct blush framed his face. Great. Now everyone would be certain he'd bought the two of them a sex toy for Christmas.

The timer sounded in the kitchen and Jack excused himself to check on dinner, making sure before he went that the gift was shoved as far back as possible. In the oven, the goose was cooking nicely. He basted it with some pan drippings and squirted more drippings onto the stuffing. Only the sound of feet coming into the kitchen warned him before his bottom was squeezed pleasantly.

"I better know who that is, or this is about to be very awkward," Jack said, before standing up.

"Sorry," Lisa said softly. "You were bent over."

"I'll remember that my irresistibility goes up when I'm bent over."

Jack reset the timer as Lisa asked, "What was that about?"

"Well, I was bent over, and you …"

"What'd you get us?"

"Weren't you the one scolding Callie earlier for trying to peek at her presents?"

"I wasn't worried about Callie opening a vibrator."

"So we're saving that for when she turns sixteen?"

Lisa rubbed her head, just in time for Ianto to come into the kitchen with them. He took one look at the two of them, and immediately added more brandy to his coffee. Jack thought about calling him on it; Ianto was a lightweight. But what the hell. This was misery enough for all of them.

"Sorry," Ianto said unexpectedly.

"For what?"

"Being an arse. I'm not ten years old, and I'll live if Christmas isn't perfect."

"Well," said Jack, clapping his hands together, "I think we've made excellent progress today. Lisa's overcome her fear of groping, and Ianto has resolved his Christmas-related childhood trauma."

"Shut up, Peter," said Lisa, and kissed Ianto on the cheek. "We'll have a good day tomorrow."

Jack let himself think about Peter for a moment. He'd finally told their sort-of staff psychiatrist about the altered timeline, because it messed with Jack's head from time to time and it was Peter Sheffield's job to be the person they told that kind of thing to. Peter had annoyingly pointed things to say about changing history and then shacking up with the people Jack had changed history for, and Jack couldn't even say Peter was just jealous since he'd Retconned the man's one memory of sleeping with him (at Peter's insistence).

Jack was willing to admit the possibility there was nothing about his life that wasn't just a little fucked up.


	2. Chapter 2

Part 2

Doug was waiting outside the kitchen as they came out. He managed to smile politely at Ianto, a little less so at Jack. He was trying, Lisa knew. Just not hard enough.

"I came to look for you. You keep popping out."

"Just checking on dinner," Jack said.

"Just getting coffee," Ianto said, and gestured with his mug. This cup was more liquor than coffee, she'd noticed, but it meant he was relaxing the rictus he'd kept on his face in lieu of a real smile.

"Just checking on them," Lisa said.

Doug's face took her in and dismissed the other two. "Have you got a moment?"

"Sure," she said, in a mood she didn't feel, and let him lead her back into the kitchen whilst Ianto and Jack returned to the uncomfortable party in the sitting room.

"Are you all right?" Doug could do niceties. He simply didn't bother sometimes.

"I'm fine. Why?"

"You're on eggshells, ever since we got here. You've hardly said hello, and you keep disappearing."

"It was just a surprise, is all. We'd have straightened up if we knew you were coming." The pun went over his head, thankfully.

"You don't need to clean house for us. We're family." That was reassuring anyway. With the three of them, they could almost keep up with the housekeeping.

Doug took her hand. "Do you need money?"

"What? No. We're fine." More than fine, honestly. Really quite a lot more. At some point, they'd have to tell Doug and Rhiannon about the accounts they'd set up in the various kids' names, but not today.

"I'd really like to give you something. I worry about you. You don't have to tell Ianto about it. I'm sure he's very proud."

Lisa clamped down on her desire to punch her brother. "Doug, for the last time, stop it. We're fine. Really."

His voice dropped to a whisper. "Then why do you keep on a boarder? Do you know how it looks? All those mouths to feed, you're working yourself half to death with little babies at home, and you have to let out a room to make ends meet."

"It's not like that. We're all making good money. Ianto and I love … having Jack around," she said with barely a pause. She shifted into the story they'd written, the easy lies: "And we couldn't possibly ask him to go. He's still pretty broken up about the divorce, and we're his best friends."

"So Ianto knew him back when he lived in Cardiff?"

Lisa paused, trying to remember if that had ever been part of the story. "No, I don't think so."

"Fast friendship, then. You'd been here barely a month when he moved in."

Lisa made an effort not to bite her lip. She hadn't mentioned Jack to Douglas on purpose for a while, caught at first in the heady rush of a new love affair unlike anything she'd expected, and later wanting to get the story set before she said anything. But Rhiannon had been there the night Jack had first shown up at the house they were renting, and she would remember him because it was _Jack_, and mention him casually to Angie over the phone.

"It's Jack," she said with a smile, when the pause had stretched uncomfortably long. "He has that effect on people. You'll see what I mean once you get to know him." Lisa squeezed him into a quick hug. "You worry too much."

"I can never worry too much about you."

Ha. Doug worried about her more than even their parents did, pushing her into the best schools, nudging her towards the proper boyfriends, even arranging job interviews behind her back. He'd shown his disapproval, too, when she'd majored in computers instead of business, when she'd taken the civil service job instead of corporate (though under Yvonne, the two melded uncomfortably and she was so glad she'd escaped to Paris). He had voiced his concerns when she'd called to tell him she was going to marry the nice Welsh boy she'd told him about, and in response to those concerns she'd abruptly switched her plans and she took Ianto's surname happily and forever. He'd arranged the job for her with his old school chum Brenda, bringing her back to this side of the Channel and, perhaps he'd hoped, back under his thumb. Instead, she'd met Gwen and Lois at lunch by accident, and while she often thought Fate had led her back to Torchwood's door, Lisa herself chose to walk through it.

No regrets. Not even that so many of her steps had been chosen by walking directly away from the path her brother would have set before her, and so were still not entirely her own. The other her, the one who'd bled out her humanity at Canary Wharf, had never even been given the choices.

"Nothing's going to happen to me, Doug," she said, because everything had already happened to her and Jack had waved it away, though not for her sake. "I'm not Kyle."

He frowned at her. "Don't."

"Are you still angry we named the baby after him?" She didn't care, not really, but she was glad to deflect the conversation, even to this.

"No. But I thought you would name him after Dad instead."

"Dad would understand."

Lisa didn't remember Kyle, knew him mostly from photographs and stories. She'd only been two when his bicycle had been struck by a car, but Doug had been outside with him and watched the whole thing. When their parents had contracted inside each other in their grief, Doug had used his own grief to cocoon Lisa, to become a second father to her although he was just eight years old. Part of her had hoped that having another son in the family wearing that name would heal the last wounds.

"I'm sure he would." He sighed. "Are you certain you don't want me to talk to Brenda? She was very disappointed to lose you. I'm positive she'd give you your old job back."

"I like my new job." She could play with technology she'd barely dreamed of when she was back in school. She got to help save the world. She'd missed that, when they'd left Paris. "And I still see Bren almost every day for lunch. I can talk to her myself."

"Of course you can," he said in a manner which he probably didn't think was patronising at all. A headache was forming between her eyes, as it always did when she had to deal with Doug for any length of time.

He meant well. He did. He wanted to save his baby sister from the world, from her own poor choices, from anything that could take her away from him forever. God. She wondered what had ever become of him in the other timeline, if Angie and the kids had been enough to save _him_ after her death. Jack was an inconstant sibyl, always.

She heard a cry from the other room, and grateful for the excuse, she hurried away from him before she could start yelling. Isabelle was whimpering, ready for her lunch, and Lisa swept her up the stairs to nurse quietly. She needed a break.

* * *

Jack's mobile rang, and he flipped it open before answering to check who it was. "Hello, Gwen. Merry Christmas." He nodded to the others before ducking into the hallway.

"I think that's the first time you've remembered to say it since we met."

"I can be trained." The smile curled around his words. "How's the family?"

"Don't ask. I'm ready to slaughter the lot. Are you enjoying the quiet day at home?"

Jack let out a weak laugh. "As it turns out, no. Ianto's sister and Lisa's brother decided to surprise us with a visit. Alice and Johnson are here, too."

"No!" He could tell she was trying not to laugh at him.

"Don't tell the others." Gwen was suddenly silent on the other end. "Gwen?" Suspicion grew in his stomach. "Who told you?"

"Johnson sent a text to Mickey as soon as she got to your place. He may have shared with Lois, who may have called me. Can't be certain, you understand. I don't think Andy knows yet."

"Remind me to put Mickey on disposal duty for a month. Johnson can help."

Gwen giggled. "Is it really awful?"

"It's not the worst place I've ever been." Not by miles, he reminded himself.

"So we're all in the same boat, at least. Mickey's considering murder as well. Tosh's family doesn't like him."

"Are they actively trying to evict him from his own home?"

"Not that I know of." And unlikely, as Tosh and Mickey hadn't moved in together, not yet.

"Then he can't complain much."

Gwen sounded hesitant. "You could tell them."

"If it was just me, I would. Of course, if it was just me, we wouldn't have this problem in the first place."

Gwen laughed. "I suppose not." She took a deep breath. "Are you okay? Really okay?"

"I'll be fine. We'll be fine."

"Let me know if you need anything. Though Rhys would never forgive me if I faked a Rift alert just to escape his mother."

"Now there's an idea. It's Christmas. Shouldn't London be under attack about now? We could all take a road trip."

She laughed again. "Have Lisa phone me later."

"I will." They said their goodbyes and Jack closed his phone. He felt better. Gwen had always been his touchstone to normalcy, and the little reminder on her own relationship with her in-laws settled him. This was expected. This was what happened. Extended family was supposed to be painful. Hell, he'd made a private art out of torturing Joe back in the day and the only reason he wasn't doing the same to Johnson was because she would shoot him, and then Lois would yell at them all again to see the psychiatrist like everyone else did.

Jack glanced into the living room, with the mad mix of people he loved and people he could barely stand, and then he opened his mobile again and speed-dialed a number.

"Happy Christmas!" said the voice on the other end, and it only sounded a little strained.

"So I hear Tosh's family hates you."

* * *

Ianto was beginning to enjoy himself. Not, he told himself firmly, in any "I'd like to do this more frequently" sort of way, but he no longer wanted to run screaming from the room. He was pleasantly warm now that he'd moved from brandy to whiskey in his cup. The children were playing nicely, and in the way of all parents everywhere, he believed his children were the most well-mannered in the room. He sat beside Johnson on the sofa, for once not in fear of his life or manhood while doing so. Angie was pleasant, at least as pleasant as she ever was towards him, and Douglas was managing to stay polite. Even Jonny was speaking at a reasonable volume as he played with Kyle on the floor, such a big kid himself. Lisa came back downstairs without Isabelle, who went down for a nap around this time, and she perched on the arm of the sofa next to him.

It was possible they were going to get through this.

Then Angie said, "So, Alice, do you see Jack often?"

"We're not close." Punctuating her words, Jack came back in from the hallway and sat down beside Steven again.

The words spilled out of Ianto before he could stop them: "We see … Kate every day."

Rhiannon asked Alice, "Is that how you two met?"

Alice put on a brittle smile. "You could say that."

"It was actually through my old job," said Johnson. "Terrible place. Management were idiots. I like the new job."

"That's in the building where Ianto and Lisa work, right?" said Douglas. "Bren said you were all together."

Jack said, "Bren may never forgive H3 for wooing Lisa away."

Ianto felt Lisa stiffen next to him, as Douglas frowned. "Bren's still not sure what H3 does."

Lisa said, "It's a dynamic, multisourcing enterprise built on a proactive vision of a global future." Lisa had always won the "who can say the corporate slogan the fastest" contests at the pub, back when they'd been allowed in the pub. God, he loved Lisa.

Jonny said, "What's that in English, then?"

"No one knows," Jack said darkly, and that won a laugh. God, he loved Jack too. Ianto looked into his mug and tried not to giggle like a kid.

Lisa bent down and kissed his cheek. She whispered, "Are you drunk?"

"Probably."

She sighed. "Okay. Love you."

"Love you."

Then she took his mug and took a long draught of what essentially was no longer coffee before grimacing and handing it back.

The oven made a noise and Jack hurried into the kitchen. Ianto heard Jack's mobile start to ring again, and Lisa slipped off the couch to join him. Ianto settled in beside Johnson, deciding he was going to sit right there.

"Why don't we spend more time together?" he asked her.

"We see each other constantly." He noticed she was playing with her own mobile. She was texting someone.

"Is that Mickey? Tell him I said hello."

Johnson glared at him, but tapped at the buttons.

"So you don't see each other often?" Angie asked Alice, and Alice shook her head. "That's a shame. We love seeing Lisa and Ianto."

Johnson said, "Mickey says you're going to hate tomorrow."

"Why?"

"Because he's seen you hungover before."

"Fair enough." He took another sip from his drink, which was now disastrously low.

Ianto said to Angie, "We all meet up for dinner sometimes."

"Once," Johnson said.

"We could meet up more often," Ianto pointed out, with what he thought was devastating logic.

"We're here today," Alice said. "Last time didn't go well."

Douglas frowned again. He did that a lot. "Sorry to hear that."

"What went wrong?" Jonny asked, because Jonny would.

"Arithmetic," Alice said, and got up. "I'll see if they need help in the kitchen."

Ianto turned to Johnson. "I'm very good at maths, you know."

"You're _really_ going to hate tomorrow," she said, continuing her silent conversation with Mickey.

* * *

Jack's eyes went wide as he answered his mobile. "Harkness." He flashed his mobile at Lisa, and she read "Downing Street" in the ID. Ah damn.

"Yes, ma'am," Jack said to the phone, which meant it was probably the PM. Double damn.

Lisa turned off the oven timer and pulled out the goose, only scorching herself a little as she did. She set it down for Jack to inspect. Honestly, she could just about make Pot Noodle, and that was the extent of her cooking skills. Paris had been designed for eating in cafés, and in London she'd been single so it hadn't been an issue. Thank God she'd married a man who could cook, and then had somehow acquired another one who honestly enjoyed it.

"We've got things under surveillance," Jack said authoritatively, and he gestured at Lisa to go check on whatever they weren't watching. She squeezed his arm and then dashed to the small office where her computer hummed quietly to itself, collecting Mainframe's reports on police, traffic, and other data feeds to check for red flags. Anything important should have raised an alarm, but of course they'd silenced the alarm earlier.

Her heart calmed when she saw that nothing was immediately flagged.

A quick search of the data from London didn't show anything out of the ordinary, either, and then as she was about to breathe a sigh of relief, news reports began spitting out of strange sightings in the sky. Mainframe pinged up in the corner of her screen: an alien vessel had appeared suddenly in Earth's near airspace, coming to rest over central London.

"Fuck. Jack!"

* * *

Jack reassured the PM once again, and then closed the phone. No use talking about something he had no data on. A quick glance told him the goose was fine and just needed to rest. He went down the hallway to Lisa's office, where he and Ianto were not allowed to touch anything. This he felt was unfair since he'd help rig up Mainframe in the first place, but Lisa insisted that this computer was hers alone.

"Fuck. Jack!"

"Right here." He placed his hand on her shoulder. "How bad?"

"Mainframe didn't even pick it up until about thirty seconds ago. How did they know?"

"Someone at UNIT was doing a routine scan and happened to see it come into the solar system, not five minutes ago."

Lisa had her own mobile out; she kept it charged by her computer. "It's me. Can you see it overhead?" Jack heard Toshiko's voice muffled on the other end.

"I don't recognise the design," Jack said. "Have they tried making contact yet?"

"Negative. Attempting a pattern match."

Jack heard someone coming down the hallway and turned, ready to block the view of the small room from prying eyes. Alice watched him curiously. "What's going on?"

He hesitated only a second. "Aliens over London."

"For God's sake," Alice said. "Do you people send up an invitation beacon on December 25th every year?"

"Get Ianto and Johnson," he told her. "Quietly." And then, because he realised it had come out as an order, he added, "Please."

His mobile rang again. Gwen. "I see it," he said in greeting.

"Who are they?"

"No idea. We're trying to match it now."

From the sitting room, Jack heard someone turn on the television, which meant this was about to get much worse in about ten seconds. Alice came back with Johnson, who looked grateful to be in work mode, and Ianto, who smiled dreamily over his mug.

"They're transmitting," Lisa said. "No translation yet."

Ianto said, "Oh. It's the Chelonians."

Jack blinked. "And you know this how?"

"Blueprints for a Chelonian carrier ship. We dug them out of the ruins of the old Archives two months ago. It's the fin design on the nacelles. They're an aquatic species, you know." At this point, he was talking to himself, but Jack nodded along. Now that he knew what to look for, he could see the pattern.

Lisa's fingers flew over the keyboard as she pulled up a translation matrix for Chelonian. Immediately, the message from the ship translated into broken English.

Jack burst out laughing. Johnson said, "You're kidding me." Ianto toasted the message and drank more.

"I hate you all," Alice said, but quietly and Jack heard the laughter in her voice.

"Tosh," Lisa said into her mobile. "How fast can you and Mickey be there? Good."

"Have Lois meet them at the site," Jack said, and Lisa relayed the message.

"What's going on?" Gwen asked him, but the nervousness in her voice was down a notch.

"They're lost," Jack said. "They're asking for directions."

"You're joking."

"We've got this covered. Update Andy and then go back to your dinner." He closed his phone and took Lisa's. "Okay, Tosh. As soon as you're there, I'll tell you what to say."

* * *

Ianto wandered back to the sitting room, where the family had gathered around the telly to watch the breaking news story.

"Another bloody alien," Rhiannon said.

Angie hugged her daughters close against her. "This is why we wanted to be out of the city. Every Christmas. It's awful."

A harried-looking reporter stood in the foreground, reporting excitedly on the events.

"It'll be fine," Ianto reassured her. As they watched, a familiar-looking van skidded into sight at the side of the screen behind the reporter, and Mickey and Lois burst out from the front seats. Tosh's chair took longer to emerge. Ianto resisted the urge to wave to them as UNIT guards partially obscured his view.

Johnson came up beside him, watching. She looked disappointed not to be there, not to be shooting anyone. Jack would have to make it up to her later.

On the screen, Tosh was punching something into her laptop while Mickey and Lois hurriedly set up a transmitter pointed at the ship. Back behind them in the office, Ianto could almost make out Jack dictating directions to the proper star cluster as Tosh sent them.

Callie got up from where she was playing and came over to him. Ianto bent down and kissed her on the head. "Why're they on telly?" she whispered loudly.

"They're saving the world," he whispered back.

"Oh. Okay." She went back to playing with her cousins.

The ship on the television screen blinked its lights once, and then vanished in a quick burst, making leaves and papers swirl around the scene.

"That was fast," Jonny said.

Rhiannon looked closely at the corner of the screen at Lois, Mickey and Tosh. "Do we know them? I could swear I've seen that Japanese girl before."

"In London?" Johnson asked, with enough scepticism to stop Rhi from asking more, even as Ianto took the opportunity to toast his friends. On the screen, he saw Mickey grab his mobile as they got back into the van. A moment later, Johnson's mobile rang. She went into the hallway to answer it.

Angie said, "I should call my mother, see if she's okay."

"I'm sure she's fine," said Douglas. "That was the shortest invasion we've ever had."

"Betcha," said Ianto, and then he covered another laugh with his mug. Which was empty. He detoured back into the kitchen for a refill.

* * *

Alice asked Jack, "Does this happen all the time?"

"Benevolent ones? Not as often as we'd like."

Lisa said, "They don't usually ask for directions." She shared a glance with Alice, and was relieved to see the other woman's defensive mask slip a little to smile as Jack raised his hands and backed off a step.

Alice said, "What I meant was, do you handle it from here all the time? Do you do this with the children in the house?"

"It keeps them safe," Jack said. "It means we have more time here with them."

Lisa suspected that last might have been the wrong thing to say, that Alice would take it as another reason to blame him for the sins of omission --- Jack's description --- that had made up her own childhood. Instead, she just looked thoughtful.

"Interesting," was all she said, and then she went back towards the sitting room.

"That went well," Jack said, and Lisa guessed he wasn't just talking about the aliens. Alice had reacted badly the last time they'd tried getting together. Jack had wanted her to meet Lisa and Ianto (they'd left all the kids at home) and make her and Johnson a part of the new family he was trying to build. The tentative peace had lasted until the first course was served and Alice had found out that Ianto was eight years her junior, and Lisa six. Apparently she could adjust to seeing her father with his latest lovers, but not to their being younger than her, and she'd closed up again into the hard shell she'd maintained ever since the incident with the 456.

But she was polite today, to the two of them if not to her father. That had to mean something. Lisa took his hand and squeezed it. "Keep up the heroics and she might warm to you yet."

"Don't count on it." But he smiled, and he kissed her hand.

* * *

With the goose ready and the other dishes mostly prepared in advance and simply needing warmed, the rest of the dinner prep consisted of all the adults bustling in and out of the tiny kitchen to set the table. Jack enjoyed the press of bodies, taking the occasional chance to "accidentally" brush against Lisa's breasts and rub up against Ianto as they crossed paths in the doorway. Soon, the table was set, the children were piled in folding chairs around a card table Jack and Ianto pulled out of the storage space in the cellar, the candles were lit, and they'd all managed to find seats.

Angie said a prayer out loud, which Jack attempted not to be uncomfortable about as he listened to the little chorus of "Amens." Alice didn't surprise him, since Lucia had raised her nominally Catholic, but he hadn't expected Lisa to join in as well.

And then there was food.

They got plates for the children first. Jack cut up Kyle's food into tiny bits for him and gave him a dab of everything, while Lisa tended to Callie. Ianto put their drinks into sippy cups. Steven and David barely noticed the food, as they continued their animated conversation about video games they'd each played. Mica and the twins complained about the sprouts, and were told to eat them anyway.

Jack finally settled down to his own plate, and there wasn't much conversation at first as everyone tucked in. He was sandwiched between Alice and Rhiannon, and while he'd normally take the opportunity to play up the mad American act, he watched his manners this time. Alice might be thawing finally, and he didn't dare upset her.

He did, however, have his priorities. "I was thinking," he said to her over a sip of water. "Since Joe couldn't watch Steven this week, maybe he could stay here one night, give you two some time off."

"Another kid in the house?" said Jonny. "You'll be starting a daycare soon." Jack noticed that Rhiannon kicked him under the table, and he grinned.

"I don't know," said Alice. "We wouldn't want to impose."

"It's no trouble," said Lisa.

"Kate could bring him 'round work one day," said Ianto, from whatever happy place he was currently visiting.

"No," Alice said, quickly. "He's not going to your workplace."

Steven's voice came from the kids' table. "Could we go see some footie, Uncle Jack?"

Jack took a long drink of his water. "I'm not much of a fan."

"I love football," Ianto said. "We'll all go. Have a boys' day. And we'll take Kyle, so Jack can have someone along who doesn't understand what's going on, either." Clearly the skies on Planet Ianto were sunny and warm just now.

Douglas said, "The season won't restart for a while yet."

"We'll plan it for February," Ianto said. "Jack can get tickets."

"Yeah, I can do that."

Steven asked, "Can I go, Mum?"

"We'll see," she said, but Jack could see on her face that she'd say yes. With a little coaxing, she might agree to the overnight too.

Angie asked Jack, "So you're staying a bit longer?"

"A bit longer than what?"

Douglas said, "It occurs to me that you might want to look for your own place. A good looking fellow like you, surely you're fighting off … the ladies. And it can hardly be easy to meet someone when you're coming home to a house full of kids."

Jack's mouth twitched. "It hasn't been a problem so far."

"You're not bringing strangers into the house with the kids here?"

"Honestly, I'm not even looking right now."

"It's hard after a breakup," Angie said, and Jack remembered that she'd been married briefly before Douglas. "But you shouldn't shut yourself off. Are you still in touch with her?"

"Not really, no."

"What was her name?"

"Abigail," he said and knew he'd pulled the name out too quickly when Alice shot him a look over her glass.

"Sorry for asking. It's probably not easy talking about her."

"Don't worry about it. It seems like years." Almost a century by their reckoning, and twenty more centuries atop that by his own.

Douglas said, "You're moving on, then. That's very healthy." He glanced at Lisa. Jack swore silently, wondering what she'd told him.

"You know," Rhi said, "I've got this girlfriend Paulette who'd love to meet you. I'll give you her number. I didn't want to before you were ready."

"Not Paulette," said Ianto. "She's ... No."

"Enough of that, you. Paulette's perfectly nice."

"And every lad on the estate knows it." Ianto took another drink, and now Jack was officially worried about him.

"Oh," said Alice to Jack. "She is your type then."

"Are you implying that I like easy or that I am easy?"

"Now there's a dissertation topic," said Johnson, which earned her glares from Lisa and Ianto. She cut into her turkey slice and took an insouciant bite.

"Paulette's not so bad," said Jonny. "She's a looker."

Ianto said, "Off by one letter."

Lisa poked him, hard. "Be nice." Rhiannon scowled at him.

Angie said, "Men don't seem to understand. Once a woman is married herself, it's her duty to make sure all the single women she knows are matched up to any available men in her life. I'm sure Lisa has already been trying to introduce Jack around to her friends."

Lisa sat back. "Do I have single female friends?"

"Lois," Ianto said automatically. "Brenda. Some of your friends from school, but they're back in London."

Jack said, "Bren's not my type, and Lois already turned me down."

"She did?" Lisa asked, and he noticed the matching look on Ianto's face. "When was this?"

"When I first met her," he said smoothly, if not with perfect honesty. When he had first met Lois, they'd been in nearby cells and he'd been too numb with grief to do anything but sit there and let her voice wash over him. He'd only sort of hit on her since then, more of a perfunctory response to being near an attractive woman than any real desire. However, according to rumour, the other him had turned up the charm much higher until she'd slapped him down firmly. Rumour also said the other him had shagged Gwen, Eugene and Emma, though not all at the same time. The other him would probably have adored meeting Rhiannon's friend.

"Anyway," he said, "I don't see this fascination with my love life. I mean, it's a wonderful topic, and I could go on for hours talking about it … "

Ianto said, "He can."

Lisa said, "He does."

Alice just rolled her eyes and sighed.

" … but," he paused. "I'm sure I was going somewhere with this."

Ianto said, "You were goin' to tell everyone to butt out."

Jack looked at Lisa. "I think it's time."

Lisa nodded and pulled Ianto's cup from in front of him. "Give." He let out a disappointed little noise as she set it out of his reach. "You'll thank us tomorrow."

"Will not." But he didn't reach for the drink, instead busying his hands with his water glass.

Johnson smiled, a rare thing from her. "This is why you don't get to come to the pub with everyone else."

"No, it's because Jack got us banned."

Jack was glad he'd long ago stopped blushing, as he remembered that night. Good night, though. Before more uncomfortable questions came his way, he said, "And the object lesson there is, never insult the pub owner's husband in front of her." Which in fact he'd done, after, and it probably had been one last nail in the coffin of getting them kicked out.

* * *

His head swam, but not as much as everyone thought. It had been a while since he'd last been this pleasantly tipsy, and that had been the night of their permanent ban from the pub down the street from work. Inhibitions died quickly between alcohol and Jack, and Ianto found he didn't mind one bit. For one thing, it meant he could tell off his brothers-in-law for being, well, them: Dougie ("I insist, call me Douglas," the prat) who didn't think Ianto was good enough for Lisa, and Jonny, who clearly was not good enough for Rhi. God alone knew what they made of Jack. Probably not good enough for anyone, except random girls Rhi knew. Paulette? Really?

Okay, perhaps he was a little drunk.

He took another bite of goose, and then set down his fork. If he was drunk, the next stage wouldn't be pretty and it would be a shame to insult such good food.

"Douglas!" he said too loudly even in his own ears. "How's work?"

"Fine, fine. We've landed a very lucrative account at the office. I think it'll really help the business grow."

Ianto listened, and then realised he could not for the life of him remember what Douglas' business did. Something with insurance? Stocks? Something respectable. Angie worked in interior design, was the kind of woman who would use the phrase "architectural element" in cold blood. Ianto had temped in offices like theirs, back when he'd first gone to London, and had found them lifeless, pointless.

"What do you do?" Alice asked politely.

"Insurance underwriting." Ah. That's what it was. Lisa had explained it to him once, but they'd been in the middle of another turf war between the two largest gargoyle tribes in Paris, and he'd mostly been concerned with keeping her talking and conscious while he checked her for concussion. Those were the days.

Jack's mobile rang. Jack opened it and Ianto knew that particular twitch as he said, "Excuse me. I have to take this."

Angie said, "Really. Can't it just go to voicemail?" She took an annoyed sip of her water.

As Jack hurried into the kitchen, Ianto heard him say quietly, "Yes, ma'am. Thank you, ma'am." Ianto wondered if the call meant more work. He could do with going out after something, though he shouldn't drive.

Douglas said, "He does seem popular today."

"Isn't he always?" Alice asked.

The kids were finishing up their food and starting to play in an antsy sort of fashion at the card table. Ianto took a napkin to Kyle's face, and another to Callie's, then shooed them to go play in the sitting room. The other children followed noisily.

Jack came back to the table, eyes bright and mischievous as he sat down and took a long drink from his glass.

Jonny said, "I nominate Jack doesn't answer his mobile again unless it's the Queen callin'."

Jack choked on his water. Lisa patted his back and they shared a look. Johnson sat back in her chair, smiling at Alice, who only stared a little as Angie cheerfully said, "Seconded!"

"Oh, you," Rhi said to her husband.

Ianto felt something in his hand. Jack had slipped him the mobile under the table. He glanced down at the list of received calls, and stifled a nervous laugh. It was one thing to know his life had taken a left turn into an alternate reality, and quite another to come to grips with the knowledge that the new reality included calls over Christmas dinner from the palace. He handed the mobile back, and Jack's leg brushed his calf comfortably. Ianto sighed at the lack of opportunity for spontaneous under-the-table sex. It had been a good pub, too.

"Speaking of the Queen," Jack said when he could breathe again, "we shouldn't miss the broadcast."

An ominous tinkling sound came from the sitting room and Lisa was first to her feet to see what had happened. Ianto managed to stand on his first try, as Kyle's distinctive cries came from the next room.

"What happened?" Lisa asked, picking him up and checking him for injuries.

The other children stood around looking guilty, as the rest of the adults joined them. Ianto scanned the room, saw the mess, including the pulled-out gifts from behind the tree. He found the broken glass ball and dashed for a dustpan. "Check him for splinters."

When he came back in, Johnson and Angie had already started picking up the larger bits of glass. Ianto shooed them aside gently and swept the bits while David took the fall for breaking the ornament. Jonny shouted at him, and Lisa held Kyle up to the light while Jack looked for any shards stuck in his skin.

"Got it," he said, and yanked out a tiny sliver of glass from Kyle's foot. Kyle howled again, and the foot was presented around for kisses while Ianto went for the medkit. Which he then could not bring out in front of everyone, it being full of proprietary salves, hypodermics, and more. He dug through for a small plaster and a squirt of antiseptic.

Rhiannon glared at all the children. "Upstairs," she told the lot of them, "and don't wake up the baby." Kyle stayed downstairs to be passed from lap to lap.

"Kids," said Douglas, chucking Kyle under the chin to get a smile from him.

"This is nothing," said Jack. Ianto could almost see Jack hastily scribble rewrites of the story as Jack said, "My … friend had twin boys, just a little younger than Steven and David. One time, their dad told them about a … tree removal problem he'd had. A few months later, they gathered up as many firecrackers after Guy Fawkes' as they could find, and Christmas morning," he startled chuckling, "they blew up the tree!"

Ianto laughed louder than he should have, but it was funny. Lisa and Alice managed to share a particular long-suffering expression that Ianto found even funnier, and his sides hurt from laughing.

"Don't listen, Kyle," said Lisa, taking him from Jack and placing her hands over his tiny ears.

"It was a long time ago," Jack said. "Can't hurt the lad now."

"Our dad used to blow things up," said Rhiannon. "Mum had to put her foot down. No experiments in the house, she said."

Ianto said, "He didn't blow them up on purpose. As it turns out, that variety of mushroom puts out methane gas." He'd looked it up, much later. At the time, he'd been barely three years old.

"Yeah," said Rhi. "The university lost half a wing of their biology building when he found that out."

"And then our carport." That'd been brilliant, with the fire engines and everything. He hadn't known it would be the beginning of a long downslope in their lives, too fascinated by the lights and the noise and the firemen. They'd had to move, as Dad went from job to job, trying his hand at anything to pay the bills. Then Mum got sick, and after she died, Dad stopped trying at all. He stopped noticing the two of them, stopped caring if either was out all night with friends. The worst that had happened was Ianto's getting caught once for nicking that shirt, and Rhi's coming home in tears to say she had to marry her loutish boyfriend, so he guessed they were lucky.

"And the carport." Rhi laughed, but Ianto didn't feel it anymore.

Johnson tilted her head, and Ianto thought she might volunteer a story. He could easily picture a young girl with dark hair, setting off firecrackers inside tin cans to see them blow. She'd set off an explosion inside Jack, once upon a time, and perhaps that was why she got up instead and went to the kitchen.

The problem with Torchwood was that you could kill alien threats but you couldn't slay your own demons. Ianto's personal demons were few and far between; the other him had taken them all, and it didn't matter if he'd dealt with them or not, because Jack's demons had ultimately killed him. Jack, who looked at Lisa like a ghost and Ianto like a soap bubble that would vanish, and whose wants had shaped reality more than once, and maybe demons could be shared after all.

Suddenly his hands didn't know what to do with themselves, and he really wanted more to drink.


	3. Chapter 3

Part 3

Things were falling apart. Lisa felt it, the way she could feel the weather about to change in her right knee, the one that had been mangled by the giant rat three years ago. Little glances, shooting at her from her brother, almost with pity. Prickles like more broken glass between her and Johnson, whom she had to trust with her life. A strange chasm in her heart between her own thoughts and those of the men she loved. Slivers of fear, as though this was it, as if it were all ending soon.

She cuddled Kyle against her, and he squirmed at the pressure.

Alice followed Johnson to the kitchen. Was she upset at the talk of explosions? Just overwhelmed at the press of too many people together, keeping too many secrets?

She heard Isabelle's cries from upstairs. The kids hadn't been as quiet as they should have been. She glanced at the boys, but Jack had started up another story. He was good at working a crowd, and perhaps they should just let him charm Doug and the rest with carefully-edited tales of his wanderings. Ianto was frowning and distant, coming down from his happy place already, eyes landing on Jack to anchor himself. As she did. God, when did they get this wrapped up in him? And what on Earth would they do without him when he inevitably tired of all this and walked away?

Lisa carried Kyle up the stairs, away from the toxic room. "Oi! You lot," she said to the older children. "Too loud." She plopped Kyle down on the floor, let him toddle over to his cousins, and then she retrieved Isabelle from the nursery. She wouldn't be hungry yet, but she was wet and Lisa took her time changing her. Anything to stay up here a bit longer.

* * *

Jack excused himself and went into the kitchen. Alice was holding Johnson's arm, speaking to her in a low tone.

"What?" he said.

"Not now," said Alice.

"It's going to be now. If they're bothering you … "

"If _they're_ bothering me?" Johnson asked, dumbfounded.

"Did I do something? Because if you're pissed off at me, at least it's a nice change from her being pissed off at me," he said, pointing to Alice. "But since I'd rather not get shot in the head on Christmas, maybe you could just tell me."

"It's what you're doing," said Johnson. "And you don't even get it, do you? All these stories you tell about all these people you've known."

"I've known a lot of people."

"Yes, and anytime it gets uncomfortable, you try to pass it off as a long time ago."

"It _was_ a long time ago," he said, trying to keep his voice down. "It was 1928."

"Whose boys were they?" Alice asked.

Jack paused. "They were your brothers. Can we not discuss this?"

"From Aberdeen."

"No. Kind of. I'll explain when we're not trying to play normal for the crowd in the next room."

"No, you won't," said Alice, and she turned away from him, resting her arms on the counter opposite. Jack knew that line in her back, the same set of shoulders Lucia had when she was angry and tired.

"And it doesn't matter anyway, does it?" asked Johnson. "Because it was a long time ago."

"That's right."

"Do you get that you're killing us all every single time you say those words?"

"What?" He stopped. "No. That's … What?"

"I'm the lucky one," Johnson said. "Two hundred years from now, you won't remember my name, won't remember my face, certainly won't remember that I dated your daughter. And I know that, and I'm all right with that. You'll hold onto Alice the longest." She reached over, touched Alice's arm. "Of all of us in this house right now, you'll remember Alice and Steven, perhaps for a thousand years." His heart twisted at the mention, and he pushed the memory away, hard.

"I'm over two thousand years old. It's … I'm not going to forget."

Alice asked him, "How much did you lose underground, Dad?"

"Nothing," he said too quickly. Then he said, "Nothing important. Nothing I couldn't find again. I remember your birthday parties. I remember when your siblings were born."

"Were there more? Are there more?"

"Not now." The one thing he'd lost under the earth was immediacy. With Tosh and Owen, even Gray, he felt the love, but the pain often seemed like it had happened to someone else. He remembered grieving for Abigail and their six-month-old daughter, both lost to diphtheria within the same week, but not with the same anguish that had led him to spend the next two years at the bottom of a bottle. He remembered the son who fell in the second war, but only as a sweet, soft memory of a handsome youth filled with life. Frank's death had piled on after months of loss, yet had felt like completion, even grace. "There's just you now."

Alice's head was towards him, but her eyes were closed. "You're going to forget them someday. You're going to forget me."

Martha had told him that it wouldn't be forever, that the strange curse would be lifted, though long after the Earth itself burned up in the sun. But someday, he would die, and he would still remember the Doctor when he did, and that meant he could hold onto Alice if he tried. "Not for as long as I can."

"And in the meantime?" asked Johnson. "Five hundred years from now? Hell, a century from now, you'll be somewhere else, among other friends, and telling the story of the one awful Christmas you had to spend with all the in-laws. And you're going to laugh it off and say it was a long time ago, and maybe you'll still know our names then and maybe not."

"It's not like that."

Johnson watched his face. "It will be. Subject for a few dirty stories about that one time you tried to be domestic with the Welsh couple you shagged for a few months, and then they'll be just as forgotten as I am. Today, this house, these kids running around underfoot, all of it is going to be dismissed as something that happened in your sordid past, told to whoever or whatever you're sleeping with, on whatever planet, and then gone forever."

Jack stood still. "What do you want me to say? I can't change what I am. Believe me, I've tried."

"No." Johnson faced away from him. "Just … go. Go be you." She looked like she wanted to say something else, and pursed her lips instead.

Jonny shouted, "It's time!"

* * *

"It's time!" came a shout from downstairs. Jonny, by the sound of it.

"Come on, kids. The Queen's going to talk." Lisa carried Isabelle downstairs, letting the other children hurry down ahead. She paused at the kitchen, tapping at the doorway without looking in. "Are you coming?"

Alice emerged first, Johnson close behind. As everyone gathered around the telly, the two of them stood as far from Jack as they reasonably could. For all that he'd insisted they all come to watch, he focused instead on his daughter, trying to catch her eye and, failing that, pulling a pout. Lisa found it hard to concentrate, with the feeling of impending doom growing in her head and in her gut.

And then Her Majesty said, "And we should not forget the sacrifices made by those who protect our borders, both around our country and also above it. We thank them for their constant vigilance … "

Lisa's face broke into a broad smile as the Queen praised their work today, even if it wasn't by name. She hoped Tosh's family was watching, although they could never know it was their daughter and her boyfriend who'd saved the day this time. Mickey'd probably spend the rest of the day with that adorable swagger he copped whenever he did something cool.

She reached out, brushed against Ianto's hand, and took it. He gave her a squeeze, then took the baby from her arms. Over his shoulder, she saw Jack and Alice continue their silent argument, even as Alice kissed Johnson on the cheek and whispered something to her.

The broadcast finished, and Jack turned the telly off, hitting the remote control for the stereo. Christmas carols filled the air.

"Is it dessert time?" Steven asked.

Alice said, "We should probably go."

"Naw," Jonny said. "You've got to stay a little longer. We've got pies."

"Please, Mum?"

"All right." Alice looked at Jack again. "But we'll go after."

* * *

Angie wanted another turn at holding Isabelle, so Ianto passed her off gently and made his way into the kitchen. Lisa and Rhiannon were sorting out the pies while he put on more coffee. He could just see Jack and Alice from where he stood, and they weren't happy with each other. Both wore their "not in front of the company" faces, though, and he had the bad feeling he and Lisa would be considered "company" for purposes of the row they were going to have.

Maybe they'd have it later. Maybe they'd all get through this, and Alice and Johnson would leave, and the others would get the hint, and they'd survive the day without killing anyone.

"I don't want to talk about this!" said Alice in a far too loud whisper, and there went that hope.

Ianto poured the drinks, laced his coffee with another shot of whiskey, and put on the pot for more.

"All right, you monsters," Rhi said, "up at the table. No gettin' crumbs everywhere."

Someone had already put Isabelle into her highchair, and Angie was feeding her some mashed potatoes from earlier, making funny faces to get her to open her mouth. "There's a dear."

Jonny poked Douglas in the ribs. "Now you're in trouble, man. She's going to want another one."

"She won't," he said, patting Hailey's hair. "Three's a bit excessive, don't you think?"

Ianto wondered if he could make it look like a Weevil attack.

Jack and Alice had moved down the hallway. Jack was gesturing. Alice's arms were folded in front of her. Ah. They'd started their row, then. Splendid. Ianto caught Johnson's eye and she shrugged. Then she pulled out her mobile and began texting again. So Mickey at least would be entertained.

The two big boys downed their desserts quickly and sped back to the sitting room to play. As the girls finished, Ianto cleared their plates away and made room for the adults. They'd all sit together and have dessert and coffee, and they could all leave soon.

Please, God, let them all leave soon.

* * *

Lisa watched the tensions among the other adults grow, and she went to the sitting room for a moment to catch her breath. David and Steven were playing near the tree again, and the scattered presents were coming undone.

"Upstairs! You're both menaces," she scolded.

She tidied up, grabbing the small package, the one without the label from Jack, and the wrapping paper was almost off. Well, half off. It had ripped certainly. She told herself it wouldn't hurt to check in advance to see just how inappropriate he'd been this time, and removed the rest of the paper.

* * *

"Why couldn't you just tell me?" Alice said.

"I was trying to protect you."

"Well, that worked, didn't it?" There was no way she could know, that she would ever know, how badly it hadn't.

And because part of him was and always would be a bit cruel, he could not stop himself from saying, "While we're passing the blame around, I remind you it was your girlfriend who broke your cover."

"I know that!" He knew that scowl on her face. He saw it in the mirror from time to time.

"Dessert for the adults," Rhiannon called. She poked her head into the hallway. "You two comin'?"

* * *

Ianto ignored his slice of cake and concentrated on his coffee. Not much longer. Not much longer. Everyone sat in near-silence, except for Kyle and Isabelle, who had stayed downstairs while the other children went back to their game in Callie's room. Kyle talked to Isabelle in mostly-intelligible English, making her giggle and reply in the burbling baby gabble she still used.

Someone was happy, anyway.

Angie smiled at Alice. "I hadn't noticed before, but that's a lovely perfume you're wearing." Alice glared at Jack and said nothing.

Rhiannon said, "The cake's very good," to Johnson, who thanked her stiffly.

"Great coffee," Jonny said. "We'll haveta have you over more often and make some at our place."

"You can't keep him," Jack said.

Angie said, "Lisa, we found a box with some of your mum's jewelry. I was hoping we could keep some pieces for Ashley and Hailey, but I'd like to see what you think about choosing some for your girls. For when they're bigger, obviously."

Lisa looked faraway, focusing suddenly on Jack. "Oh," she said, after a long pause. "That's … Yes. We should do that." She took a bite of her cake.

"That's always nice," said Alice, "when you've got family mementos."

"We're not starting this again," Jack said.

"What I meant," said Alice, "was that my _mother_ left me some lovely pieces that belonged to her grandmother."

"Were you close to your mum?" Angie asked. "You said your dad wasn't around much."

Jonny snorted. Rhiannon slapped him on the arm.

"Share," said Ianto. "We could all use some humour."

Jonny looked at Alice and actually began to blush. "It's nothin'."

Alice shined her diamond glare on him. "Now it's clearly something."

Jonny said, "Yer mam raised you, no dad, it's no wonder you're playin' on the other team, is all."

"What?"

"I'm not judgin'! People do all whatnot these days. Got no problem with it, me." He gestured with his spoon at Jack. "Not like Mister Perfect, here. Mate, you gotta get past it."

"Get past what?" Jack asked in confusion.

"Bein' so upset that your sister's a lesbian. You two have been fighting all day about it. She's your sister. Don't be so small-minded." And Jonny sat back and took a large, satisfied bite of cake.

The rest of them stared.

Ianto wondered, "Is this what going mad feels like?"

"I think it is," said Lisa, which was how he knew he'd said it aloud.

Jonny said, "I'm just sayin' what everyone else is thinkin'."

Johnson opened her mouth, and then shut it. She stood up and grabbed her phone, dialing. "I've got to tell Mickey this one."

Jack shouted, "Will you stop telling Mickey everything about today? He'll find out soon enough!" He pushed back from the table, clearly upset, and the chair made a loud squawk against the lino.

The noises startled the children. Kyle started to cry, which set Isabelle off. Jack bent down and picked him up, while Ianto scooped up Isabelle.

"Sorry, big guy," Jack said, jostling Kyle in his arms.

Angie stood up. "Here, let me."

"I've got him."

"I've got children of my own," she said, pulling Kyle away. "There's tricks you learn."

Lisa stood up and firmly took Kyle from Angie and handed him back to Jack. "Yes. You learn to keep them with people they know and trust. Jack's fine with the kids."

"That's reassuring," Alice said.

Douglas said, "Tell me, Alice. You've known Jack the longest, obviously. Are you comfortable having him watch your son?"

Her eyes widened. "That's complicated."

"Very complicated," Jack said. He rubbed Kyle's back, trying to soothe him, but dropped the hand as Douglas watched.

"Shouldn't be," Douglas said. "You were talking about letting Steven spent the night here, but you don't like that idea, do you?"

Alice said nothing. Jack had told them about Steven, in the other timeline. Even in this one, he'd nearly traded Steven's life to save the world. It had been over a year and Alice was still deeply resentful, and there was nothing anyone could do about it.

"And," Douglas went on, relentless, "if Jack's own sister won't trust him around her child, why is he living in a house with three children?"

"Because we do trust him," Lisa said.

Isabelle began to squirm, and Ianto set her down.

"You shouldn't," Alice said. "I wish you could, but you shouldn't. Don't think for a minute that if it had been one of your kids there instead, that he would have hesitated any more than he did."

Rhiannon looked from face to face. "What's going on?"

"Nothing," said Jack. "It's over. It's dealt with."

"Until next time," Alice said. Johnson came back into the room, her face pinched, likely remembering her own role in the mess. "I don't intend to be cruel to you. I know you don't believe me, but it's true. But I can't trust you. You're not safe."

Jack blanched. "You're right. I'm not." He was never awkward, but it was with a clumsy grace that he handed Kyle to Lisa. "I should … " He didn't finish.

And Ianto saw it as plain as day. Jack would hurry off, as he'd been about to before, and he would stay away, and he'd find excuses to keep staying away, and perhaps he'd come back for a short while, to see the kids, to enjoy himself a little in their bed, but once he walked out the door today, it was over. Ianto and Lisa would try to rebuild the life they'd originally planned together, only now draped in the shadow of something more wonderful and lost, and the children would gradually forget they'd had another dad, and everything would be so unbelievably fucking normal. He felt the future tighten around his chest, around his throat, in coils of might-have-beens.

Jack might have picked their timeline, but Ianto was damned if he wasn't get a say in his own future.

He didn't know he was standing until he felt the sway of his legs beneath him. As Jack rounded the table to go, he put out a hand to help Ianto steady himself. Good. That made it much easier to grab onto Jack, pull him in, and kiss him with all the desperation in his soul.

"Stay," he breathed into Jack's mouth. "Please." And then there was no room for more words.

* * *

Lisa let herself smile as Ianto kissed Jack, hard, in front of everyone. Jack pushed back at first, a little, and then let himself sink into it. For all that Jack could be irresistible, he could never resist Ianto. It was comforting in a way.

She took a sip of her own coffee, and enjoyed the flavour.

Doug touched Lisa's hand, and she pulled away as he said, "Brenda told me about Jack, about that cruise line he runs. I suppose these things run in families." He nodded to Alice. "No offense."

"Of course not," said Alice, rolling her eyes and then shading them from the view of her father enjoying himself.

Rhiannon sat back. "No. Way."

Angie turned to her. "Lisa, I'm so sorry."

"Don't be," Lisa said. "They'll come up for air in a few minutes, and then I'll have a go." She laughed, and hugged Kyle as the stares turned to her.

Johnson said, "I'm going to get more coffee," and headed into the kitchen.

As predicted, the boys finally broke apart, and Jack helped Ianto back into his chair. They looked like a pair of cats who'd gotten into the cream, and Lisa laughed again. Then she set Kyle down to play on the floor, and pulled Jack in for a deep kiss. His hands went to her face, threaded through her hair as she clung to him, taking strength from his shoulders, breathing his breath. He tasted like coffee, and a little like whatever Ianto'd been drinking, and it was perfect.

When they broke, she watched his eyes, and they were clear again, and she was glad. "Love you," she said.

"Love you," he replied, and she believed him.

"It's very hard," Ianto was saying, gesturing a bit much, "to get the right pressure going with three sets of lips. You can't do it."

"You can," Jack said. "_We_ can't."

Doug and Angie were already standing. "We're leaving now," said Doug.

"No," Ianto said, standing again, and carefully pushing Doug back into his chair. "You're going to stay for a minute, and you're going to listen."

Jack said to Lisa, "I love it when he's assertive."

"It's adorable," she agreed, and rested her head against Jack.

Johnson came back with the coffee pot and began topping everyone up. Lisa held up her own mug, but Johnson ignored her. Ah well.

"Jack is staying," Ianto said. "We love him. Apparently he and I have been dating for two thousand years."

"Oh God," said Alice, dreamily.

"And Alice here is not Jack's sister. She's his daughter. The thing with the aliens that made the kids talk? Jack handled that, and Steven almost died. And we understand that's why Alice is skittish about letting Jack alone with him again. That's why it's complicated."

"Coffee?" Johnson asked Doug, and when he didn't reply, she gave him some and encouraged him to take a long drink.

Ianto was in full steam now. Rhiannon and Jonny sat there gaping, and Lisa tried hard not to laugh again. "We all work for a secret organisation dedicated to fighting aliens and protecting the Earth. The Queen was talking about us today because of that thing with the Chelonians."

"Of course she was," said Angie soothingly. Johnson gave her more coffee. Angie looked at Lisa imploringly. "He's bonkers," she mouthed. Lisa nodded.

"Also," Ianto said. "We're not even on the right timeline." That got Alice's attention, and Johnson stopped in mid-pour for Jonny's mug. "There's this time-traveling alien named the Doctor. Bit of a prat, but he keeps saving the world." He looked at Rhiannon. "He may have slept with Mum."

Jack sighed. "He didn't."

"You weren't there. You don't know. Anyway, Mum hung out with him in his magic blue police box that goes through time and space, and as a favour to her, he changed time."

"Why?" Rhiannon asked, clutching her mug like a lifeline to sanity, as her brother had clearly lost his own mind.

"Because I was dead." Ianto frowned at that. "Jack, the other me is always going to be dead. You know that, right? I'm not him. I'm never going to be him."

"I know."

"Because I know he's the one you really love."

"Ianto Jones, do you think I'm ever only going to be in love with one person? Or in your case, one copy?"

Ianto blinked at him. "Good point." He turned back to his sister. "So I was dead, and Mum didn't like that much so Jack and the Doctor changed time. Which is good, because Lisa was apparently a robot, and also dead."

Johnson asked Jack and Lisa, "How much has he had to drink?"

"A lot," Lisa said.

"Ianto?" said Rhiannon. "Mum's dead. She died a long time ago."

"Time travel, Rhi. Try to keep up."

"Quite a lot," Lisa amended.

There was a soft snore. Lisa glanced across the table to see Angie had nodded right off to sleep, her head lolled on her neck. Doug's eyes were closing. Jonny covered a yawn, and now that she was looking for it, Rhiannon was glassy-eyed as well.

"And then they sent us to France, because apparently the Doctor shagged Madame de Pompadour in the eighteenth century there once."

Jack said, "He did?"

"Mickey said so. He also invented the banana daiquiri. It may have been the same night."

Alice watched him strangely, but her eyes were wide awake as Johnson perched next to her and took her own, cold cup of coffee into her hands.

"Sit down, love," Lisa said. "They're not listening anymore."

"Fine," said Ianto, and he plopped into his seat. Jack moved over to him and kissed his forehead.

Johnson looked around the table at the heavily-drugged guests. "I hate this holiday," she said, and drank her coffee.

* * *

Jack looked over the sleeping pile at the other end of the table. "Johnson, is there a reason you brought Retcon to Christmas dinner?"

"We were coming over to yours. I've already seen you naked once, Jack. If I was going to have to scrub out my own eyes later, I thought this would be the easiest way."

Alice said, "When did you see him naked?"

"It's part of the employment contract," said Ianto. "At some point, all Torchwood employees must see Jack's penis. It's in the fine print." Lisa burst into more giggles.

Johnson grabbed for a cup of dosed coffee, and Alice pulled it away from her.

"At least nobody died," Lisa said. "And the Queen thanked us. That's a pretty good Christmas, for us."

"That reminds me," Ianto continued, looking at Jack. "You know next year's budget has been on your desk for two weeks now. You need to sign it. Gwen's approved her copy already."

"I'll get to it."

"Get to it faster. New year in a week, and we'd all like to get paid."

"Yes, dear," said Jack exaggeratedly. He petted Ianto's hair, which earned him a snort.

Johnson said, "We need to put them somewhere. They won't all believe they fell asleep at the table."

Jack folded his arms. "You're the one who drugged them."

"You're welcome." She looked at Ianto. "And you are forbidden from drinking ever again."

"Amen," said Jack.

Lisa got up from the table suddenly and went into the sitting room. Jack watched her go. She'd been withdrawing from them all day, hiding when she could. They really needed some alone time.

She came back in, and he went to take her hand and then stopped when he saw what she was carrying. "Lis … "

"When the kids were playing, it got unwrapped. Jack, what is this?" She opened the box.

"Tungsten," he said automatically. "I was looking at titanium, but this wears longer. I like things that last a long time." He plowed on, because clearly stopping now was out of the question. "I had yours made thin so if you wore it on the same finger as your other ring, it wouldn't really show. If you wanted."

"Oh." Her mouth was set perfectly still. Ianto said nothing, merely looked at the highly-polished bands as he would examine a new artefact: intrigued, but careful not to touch until the full range of properties were known. (It had been a hard-learned lesson. His brief ability to telepathically communicate with housecats had been useless.)

"This was not how this was supposed to go," Jack said. "We were going to have dinner, it was going to be quiet, just us and the kids. I was going to bring the box out over the crackers."

"It _is_ just us and the kids," said Lisa. "Alice is your child."

"We had crackers?" Ianto asked.

"They're in the kitchen," Jack said. "Are you following along?"

Ianto shrugged. "What's to follow? You bought wedding rings."

"And you're okay with that?" For some reason, he'd expected Ianto to be upset. Jack had mentally prepared himself for a mild panic attack. "Where I come from, this is pretty common, though of course it's not legally recognised here."

"You've said."

"Ah." Again, not the response he'd been expecting. Jack was almost disappointed, a little. "Lisa?"

"We've been trying to get papers drawn up," she said. "For you to have custody of the kids if something happens to us."

"Good idea," said Johnson. "It's a dangerous job. You'll probably want to name Rhiannon as a backup in case Jack fucks off with the Doctor again, though."

"What?" said Jack.

"Duck!" said Kyle from the floor.

"Language," Ianto said.

"It's been hard to get to a solicitor," said Lisa. "Been busy."

Johnson took another sip of her drink. "Take an afternoon. I'll arrange it with Gwen."

"Excuse me," said Jack. "First, I approve time off. Second, what?"

"Jack," Ianto said, "barring needs that involve the end of the world, are you going to stay with us as long as you can?"

"Well, yeah. I … Yeah."

"Lisa?"

"Hm?"

"You're here for good, right?"

"Good. Bad. I already promised you that."

"And you're still staying. With both of us."

"Always."

"And I'm not going anywhere. So that's settled." Ianto sat back, satisfied.

"It is?" Jack said.

"Looks like," said Alice. "I am never calling you two Mum and Dad. Just so you know."

"Agreed," said Lisa. "Do you think Steven might eventually manage Uncle and Auntie?"

"We'll see."

Jack looked around. He'd had control of this situation a while back. He was certain of it. "What just happened?"

Johnson said, "I think you just got married. Put your damn ring on."

Jack looked at the box in Lisa's hand. That had been the plan, more or less, with a bit more explanation of how things went in a typical bonding ceremony back home, a mention of how he didn't want to rush them into anything but also how he'd been getting to this point for thousands of years by his own reckoning. Even how he'd understand if they weren't ready, if it was too much, if it was easier for now to keep what they had, that he could wait.

But there was Ianto plucking the box from Lisa and pulling out the ring that was fitted to his hand, and there she was taking hers, and he'd been right, they snuggled in perfectly with the gold bands already there. Jack's was a bit larger, gunmetal grey and plain, and light as silver as he slipped it on.

"So," Johnson said. "Where are we going to stow these four until they wake up? I'm warning you, I won't help you get any of them naked to put in embarrassing positions for blackmail later."

Jack raised an eyebrow.

* * *

It was going on midnight when the noises from the kids finally stopped upstairs. The girls were bunked down in Callie's room with blankets and pillows on the floor. David, and with Alice's permission Steven, had taken over Kyle's room, while Kyle was placed in the nursery for the night after Isabelle's last feeding. They'd hauled Douglas and Angie up to the spare bedroom, and with a bit of hefting, managed to put Jonny and Rhiannon in theirs. In the morning, the four of them would believe they had overindulged in eggnog. Probably. After the help, Alice and Johnson left for a quiet night at home.

There'd been a call around seven PM, a lone Weevil on Bute Street. Before Jack could even draw breath to suggest they go, Andy had called in to say he was taking care of it, and Gwen said she'd drop over to help him bring it in. Everyone wanted time away from family today, apparently.

As the calendar turned to December 26th, Lisa went to check Mainframe, just in case something had shown up that hadn't alerted them yet. Ianto lay sprawled on the sofa, half-asleep, half-working on his hangover. Jack pulled a blanket over him and kissed his head.

"Please tell me we don't have New Years plans," Ianto murmured sleepily, as Jack unplugged the lights from the tree.

"We don't."

"Good."

Lisa yawned as she returned. "Everything's quiet. I turned the alarm back on." She settled on the sofa next to Ianto, and Jack watched them for a moment, content.

"I'm going in to work for a bit," he said, reluctantly pulling on his boots.

Ianto sat up, and Lisa straightened. They wore matched expressions of concern, and his heart melted just a little.

"I want to make sure nothing's out of place, feed the Weevils, water the dinosaur. I'll be back in an hour. I promise." He leaned in and kissed Lisa, then Ianto. "Feel free to get started without me."

"We will," said Lisa, and nestled her head against Ianto's shoulder, her hand splayed against his chest. Honestly, they both looked too worn out for sex, but maybe after a hour's nap, they'd be up for playtime. Or more likely, they'd point out that with everyone sleeping right upstairs, it would be a bad idea to shag on the floor tonight. He also doubted Lisa would let him nick Douglas' swipecard from the hotel so they could make good use of the room going empty.

"Back soon," he said, and amused himself with ideas about some constructive fondling on the sofa later.

At the Hub, all was as breathlessly still as when he'd left this morning. Andy's Weevil was safe in the cells with the others watching soap operas. Andy and Gwen had already fed them. Jack noticed candy wrappers on the floor by Frycheul's basket. That would also have been Gwen, who remained grateful about the one time their otherwise docile pet had attacked that rogue Rotanion that'd gotten loose in the Hub and gone after Edward. A tiny bit of chocolate dribbled out from the corner of the dinosaur's mouth as he settled deeper into his nest, nose draped lazily over his tail. Jack missed Myfanwy, who'd been a much better watchdog with far more style.

Nothing new through the Rift, in or out, and if Tosh's predictor software was working, nothing major coming for at least the next day. Monday looked troublesome, but it would be a quiet weekend for once, a rare gift, if he didn't count the Hoix or the Weevil or the lost Chelonians or the in-laws. Nothing from the Doctor, which was unusual but not unexpected, with the world not in peril this time. One email, when he went to check: Martha, sent earlier, wishing him a good day.

He grinned, rubbing his thumb against the unfamiliar metal on his finger. It had been a good day, eventually, and he replied to her with thanks and wished the same back. Then with a last look around, he shut down his computer and turned off the unnecessary lights except for Frycheul's nightlight.

Jack went home.

* * *

The End


End file.
